A quick blog on LTO tapes roadmap and specs ( Photocourtesy of LTO Ultrium owners)

android is learning to run

Just like a baby, after 18 months or so, Android OS has started to show that is able to run. If cupcakes was liken to a baby learning to walk, Froyo will likely be it learning to run. Infact it is already showing some strength against the iphone OS prior froyo release.

Here is the list of milestone to date on android OS.
20080923 - Android 1.0 [1st release]
20090309 - Android 1.1 [2nd release]

20090430 - Android 1.5 [cupcake]
20090915 - Android 1.6 [donut]
20091026 - Android 2.0 [eclair]
20100112 - Android 2.1 [flan]
20100520 - Android 2.2 [froyo]
TBA         - Android 3.0 [gingerbread]


 

*picture courtesy of web resources*

Mathematica & Wolfram Alpha

Been busy quite lately with works piling and planning for some overseas work. I have came across something useful today. It a site called wolfram alpha. They even have cool mathematical and computational tools now ver 7.0 mathematica.

Well wolfram alpha is about making computational mathematical online and it is really cool. wonder if smartphone is allow at school or exam.. I dont have to remember all those differential equations steps if that allow ...

http://www.wolframalpha.com

AHAH - Asynchronous HTML over HTTP

AHAH is a simpler version of AJAX.  AJAX uses the XML file while in AHAH, it uses XHTML
In AHAH you can display external XHTML pages inside your HTML page as the browser are already equipped to handle them.

In AJAX, developer actually need to write code that can parse the XML, extract data and show result.

Oracle Maximum Availability Architecture

I am excited to be going for a 3 day workshop by Oracle on the following week. At present I only aware of Oracle Maximum Availabilty Architecture comprising of the 4 parts:-

• Real Application Cluster(RAC)
• This is to protect for any DB server failure
• Automatic Storage Management(ASM)
• This is to protect from DB Storage failure
• Flashback
• This is to perform a quick undo on user or admin errors.
• Data Guard
• This is for the automated failover of DB system to standby DB site.

I do wonder if the Change Assurance Feature part of this architecture. I hope to learn more and how the MAA is integrated, deployed and what is the best practices.

Private PAAS by Oracle

In recent week, I had the opportunity to attend all three vendors presentation on the topic of  cloud computing. Today, I shall blog about one of them, the Oracle cloud offerings, or they termed it as Oracle Private PaaS(Platform as a Service). I have been using oracle products for many years now, and was very interested in the presentation given by the Oracle reps.

Oracle Private 'PaaS' aimed to achieve these 5 parts.

1) Shared Infrastructure with dynamic scaling
To create an infrastructure which can dynamically scale,  Oracle re-utilized the Grid technology. On the application front, there is an Application grid, where the tools like Weblogic Server, JRockit, Coherence, Tuxedo resides.On the data management, Oracle has the Database Grid & Storage Grid. Concept of In-Memory Database Cache(IMDB), Real Application Cluster(RAC) and Automatic Storage Management are also in built in the private PaaS offerings. The OEM also allow to do the administering.

2) Support component sharing
To support component sharing, Oracle have the SOA & BPM together with the Oracle workflows and Identity Management(IM).

3) Support fast deployment
Pre-configured images, Oracle VM and new component like the Weblogic Server Virtual Edition(VE), can be assembled using the Oracle Assembly Builder by making them into Assembled catalog and then the can be deployed as a platform.

4) Self-serviced
Oracle EM can help PaaS to be self-serviced by scaling up and down.

5) Management and Automation
Lastly management and automation can be done via OEM. IM allow identity management of users.

Oracle believe, most organization providing application services really need a private PaaS solutions instead of IaaS. The focus should be in facilitating the build of apps, making it easier and flexible and can be deploy fast.
Oracle propose this by adopting their Private PaaS solutions.

The cloudburst of IBM

Was fortunate to attend another interesting cloud presentation by a consultant from UK (Mr Lewis Troke) on the cloud offerings by IBM. He was a captivating presenter, whom was very generous to share hs knowledge on cloud computing.At the end, the message that he wanted to put across was that Cloud computing is more business than IT. Technology and IT are still important, but to make cloud computing work, the business must champion it

For this post, I will like to narrow down on "cloudburst." the cloud enabler appliance from IBM.

Cloudburst is actually an IBM hardware appliance that integrates service management software with servers, storage and services for use in the private cloud. It is used to build, configure, deploy and manage the WebSphere private cloud environments. It is also used for building patterns and configuration, which are the Virtual images and script packages so that the deployment can be easier and automated, via the portal.

The virtual images are packaged in the WebSphere Application Server Hypervisor Edition(WAS-HE) under the Catalog. It contains WebSphere components, like the IBM HTTP server, and a Linux operating system. The (WAS-HE) is packaged according to the Open Virtualization Format (OVF) standard.

The steps involved in setting up a private cloud are firstly by integrating IBM cloudburst in the datacenter and network. Then assigning the local storage. Users account and security profiles are also created. The pattern creator can then create some pattern templates. After patterns are created and agreed upon, it will be saved and access list to it will be established. Likely the cloud administrator will then in future deploy this pattern as or when required.

To define the cloud, the administrator normally begin with hypervisors. The details of the hypervisor include the installed URL, authentication information, virtual machine instances and IP groups (DNS servers, gateways, and  range of IP addresses available for the cloud)

The cloudburst can also tracks and reports cloud usage for charge-back based on one's consumption. Other settings include security, backup/restore actions, firmware upgrades, logging, trace auditing and power management.

At the time of this post the cloudburst is at version 1.2.